Uphostery - first attempt at recovering a car seat.

[FricFrac]

I've got a little bit of experience fixing up a couple of antique chairs so I thought I'd try my hand at some automotive upholstery. I bought an industrial sewing machine so I'm kind of commited now The plan is to do the interior on the 4dr 510 but thought I'd practice on my daughter's 240SX interior. The seats are BEAT! I can only make them better than what they are and that's not saying much - a piece of duct tape is a vast improvement

Once I get this one under my belt the 280ZX is on the "to do" list


The 4dr 510 and future upholstery recipient


So lets start with some before pictures. Like I said I can only improve on this

[FricFrac]

I won't put all the pictures I took here but I'll try and keep it as step by step as possible so you can see the process. Take lots of pictures as you take it apart. Sometimes there is something you need to go back as reference. In this picture you can see where the top stitch was done so that you replicate it when you sew it back together and it lays properly.



Bottom of the seat - you can see where the hog rings attach the seat cover and hold it in place.



On furniture you use staples into the frame to hold the fabric in place. On a car seat you use hog rings and wire in a pocket sewn into the cover.


or a reinforcement of some sort like these plastic sew on strips


I'm reusing the wires from whats left of the seat covers so I make sure they are labeled. You can make your own of course. It looks like they bend the ends back to keep it from poking through.

[FricFrac]

I won't put all the pictures I took here but I'll try and keep it as step by step as possible so you can see the process. Take lots of pictures as you take it apart. Sometimes there is something you need to go back as reference. In this picture you can see where the top stitch was done so that you replicate it when you sew it back together and it lays properly.



Bottom of the seat - you can see where the hog rings attach the seat cover and hold it in place.



On furniture you use staples into the frame to hold the fabric in place. On a car seat you use hog rings and wire in a pocket sewn into the cover.


or a reinforcement of some sort like these plastic sew on strips


I'm reusing the wires from whats left of the seat covers so I make sure they are labeled. You can make your own of course. It looks like they bend the ends back to keep it from poking through.

[FaLKoN240]

Appreciate the post but see if you can resize the pics, they're huge even on my 27" monitor

[FricFrac]

Not sure why they are so huge here. Shows up fine on most other forums :/

[FricFrac]

Label and pictures.... if you don't need them no problem but once you're scratching you head it's too late






I tried ironing the leather to make a template but a lot of them have a coating similar to vinyl and it will shrink and pucker so I use weights from my barbells to cold press them as flat as possible. Once that's done I stapled them to some heavy cardboard to make templates.

[FricFrac]

I won't put all the pictures I took here but I'll try and keep it as step by step as possible so you can see the process. Take lots of pictures as you take it apart. Sometimes there is something you need to go back as reference. In this picture you can see where the top stitch was done so that you replicate it when you sew it back together and it lays properly.



Bottom of the seat - you can see where the hog rings attach the seat cover and hold it in place.



On furniture you use staples into the frame to hold the fabric in place. On a car seat you use hog rings and wire in a pocket sewn into the cover.


or a reinforcement of some sort like these plastic sew on strips


I'm reusing the wires from whats left of the seat covers so I make sure they are labeled. You can make your own of course. It looks like they bend the ends back to keep it from poking through.